ARU — An Industry Of Metals

Here’s a cryptic cdr… The confusion starts with the packaging, which at first glance looks a little “shonky”: a folded insert, behind a front piece. This front piece is a rough square cut from very thin sheet metal, with artwork taped onto it; the fact that its actual sheet metal is nice, but the fact that the artwork is taped on somewhat cheapens it - maybe I’m being overly picky. The insert, though, is very elegant indeed - a two-sided sheet with rather beautiful imagery. One of these images looks a bit like someone photocopied a pile of rusty nails; the other looks like an old futurist painting - both are black and white, and filthy. The genius of the insert lies in the way its folded. Maybe I’ve had a sheltered life, but its the first time I’ve seen this done; its nothing spectacular, but its a very simple solution to holding a cd, in a sheet of paper, in a cd wallet.

As for the album itself, I feel like I’m missing out on something - it seems as if a lot of thought and care has gone into the structure and pacing of the cd, yet the sounds themselves are somewhat underdeveloped and uninspiring. All of the tracks are constructed out of loops, feedback, percussion and noise; and, whilst its unclear, some of the sounds may be actual recordings of junk metal and engineering machinery - its hard to tell. The production is quite low fidelity, which blunts some of its power; and the saturation further restricts the already limited palette of sounds. Saying this, there are some nice textures and moments - track 24 is built around a pounding drum beat, which gives the ears a welcome break from the previous tracks of trashy noise; and track 3 has a suitably piercing blast of treble skree. But, I have to say, my ears find little joy to latch on to. If some of the tracks are indeed unprocessed recordings of machinery, that would be technically interesting; but its still not very engaging. With the prominent percussive elements, it actually reminds me of the recent Cut Hands album; but with far less power, intricacy, energy and ideas.

The cryptic nature of “An Industry Of Metals” is contained in its structure: nineteen tracks each of fifteen seconds length, then a further nineteen tracks of longer lengths - the last of which is longest by far, at seven and a half minutes. I feel like this is of some consequence; but, after a reasonable amount of thought, I really can’t find any… Certainly all of the tracks sound like they were recorded at the same place, at the same time; but I can’t see that the track-listing represents any kind of relationship between them. Its a mystery.